The 67-year-old was made a Dame Commander of the British Empire for her services to drama.

She was named in The Queen’s Birthday Honours List in the Summer alongside other big names including Sir Billy Connoly and Dame Beryl Grey.

After receiving the honour from The Queen, Dame Julie said: “It was so numbing.

“The Queen said, ‘It’s so marvellous that you’ve got this, I’m so pleased’ and ‘How long have you been doing acting?’

“I said ’43 years’, and she said ‘In so many different things, well done.”‘

“The most exciting time was when the letter came, I looked at it and thought ‘what?’ because it’s that sort of very formal speak, ‘what does this say?’ then I saw dame and I thought ‘bloody hell’.

Dame Julie said that becoming a Dame is a huge honour, and compared it to other awards she has received saying: “It’s a different thing, it’s the Government and the Queen, it’s just a very different feel.

“It’s a lovely thing, I can’t explain it. The Baftas are fantastic and really important but it is about the business, and this is too but it’s also about the country, so it’s special in that sense.”

Dame Julie’s breakthrough role was in the 1983 film Educating Rita in which she was nominated for an Oscar.

Walters broke out in the 1983 film Educating Rita alongside Sir Michael Caine, a performance for which she was nominated for an Oscar.

Since then she has gone on to appear in Billy Elliot, Mamma Mia!, Calendar Girls and several Harry Potter movies.

A Damehood is not the first honour the actress has received from The Queen

In 1999 she was appointed awarded an OBE. Nine years later, she was appointed a CBE in 2008.